The Hardest Part of Culture Change? Getting Leaders to Take Ownership
A short introduction: I'm the author of You Can Culture: Transformative Leadership Habits for a Thriving Workplace, Positive Impact and Lasting Success and co-founder of Heart Management. I hope you find this newsletter helpful and hopeful!
After helping organizations assess their culture, I often hear this sentiment from leaders: "Yes, these things need to change, but there's nothing we could have done differently and nothing I can personally change going forward." The responsibility is always elsewhere.
And I get it. I struggle with this too. Recently, while discussing the importance of taking ownership with an executive, he asked if I was making a general comment or implying he sounded defensive. I admitted he seemed defensive, then added, "But I would be too." It's deeply human to want to avoid regrets and taking personal responsibility for problems and failures. However, unless we overcome this tendency we won't see the desired change.
Jay Barney , professor of strategic management and coauthor of The Secret of Culture Change, studied successful culture transformations. He found that the most effective initiatives didn't begin with values discussions or announcements—they started with leaders taking bold, tangible actions that embodied the desired culture.
A CEO's challenge
One of our clients, a utility company, needed to transform their culture for better business alignment and workplace health. As my colleagues and I helped their executive team identify necessary changes in leadership behavior and incentive systems, they got stuck in all the reasons why they couldn't alter their methods or deal with inappropriate behavior from high performers. While claiming change was required, they wanted to avoid doing the actual work.
I challenged the CEO to reflect on her own role and identify what she was personally willing to change to improve the culture. To bring meaningful change, she needed to start by taking ownership, then extend the same challenge to her leadership team and managers. Only after everyone had identified their contributions should they ask anything of the broader organization. She embraced the challenge, and the leadership followed.
The breakthrough
I saw signs of a breakthrough when a department head began proactively scheduling meetings with other leaders to ask how they experienced collaborating with his department and what he and his department could do to improve the collaboration—demonstrating true ownership mindset.
I've found that, without readiness to acknowledge our role, efforts to influence culture become manipulative and inauthentic and ultimately fail.
That's why "Taking Ownership and Action" is the second transformative practice in You Can Culture.
Focus on what you can control
In his classic The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey introduced the circle of influence/circle of concern model. I use a modified version with three circles:
Circle of Control represents things you control—your actions, attitudes, and responses.
Circle of Influence represents things you can't control but can influence—your team through example, vision, stories, and the behavior you encourage or tolerate.
Circle of Concern represents things outside your control or influence that still impact your organization—market conditions, pandemics, company strategy, or upcoming layoffs. Depending on your role, the scope of what you can influence or control varies.
In working with leaders, I often return to these circles and implore them that while they shouldn't disregard their circle of concern, they should focus on what they can control or influence.
As Siobhan McHale wrote in The Insider's Guide to Culture Change,
"Never underestimate your power to change the culture, simply by changing your behavior."
Instead of finding reasons why issues are everyone else's fault, ask yourself: "What is my responsibility?"
Questions to consider
In You Can Culture, I challenge leaders to consider the following three questions:
Identify a specific cultural element where you see critical need for change—attitudes or behavioral patterns that must shift.
Examine your role. What behaviors have you modeled, encouraged, or tolerated that contributed to current patterns? (If you struggle to identify your role, ask fellow leaders or team members directly.)
Commit to action. How can you, by taking ownership and changing your behavior or integrating new positive behaviors, actively contribute to the necessary change?
The transformation begins with you.
💡To learn more about the practice of taking ownership and action, or to inspire your team, read more and order You Can Culture here.
